Trump trade announcement offers hope of breakthrough

The president last night announced he is hoping to arrange a meeting with Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping to bring an end to the long-running trade stand-off between the two nations, provided further progress can be made in negotiations.

Share

From pv magazine International

Last night’s announcement by President Trump of a delay in the imposition of escalated tariffs on Chinese goods will offer a ray of light to the solar industry.

The president announced via a couple of tweets – how else? – that the planned escalation of tariffs on $200 billion worth of Chinese imports from 10% to 25% on Friday would be delayed after “substantial progress” was made in trade talks between the two nations.

I am pleased to report that the U.S. has made substantial progress in our trade talks with China on important structural issues including intellectual property protection, technology transfer, agriculture, services, currency, and many other issues. As a result of these very……

….productive talks, I will be delaying the U.S. increase in tariffs now scheduled for March 1. Assuming both sides make additional progress, we will be planning a Summit for President Xi and myself, at Mar-a-Lago, to conclude an agreement. A very good weekend for U.S. & China!

Those retaliatory measures for what Trump sees as currency manipulation, the unfair application of state subsidies and intellectual property theft by the Chinese authorities included tariffs on solar cells and modules as well as inverters, AC modules and some batteries. Among all of these products, the most serious consequences were expected for the inverter market.

With Trump announcing plans to meet Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping in Florida to sign an agreement ending the trade stand-off if sufficient further progress is made in negotiations, a thawing in trade relations could bode well for Chinese inverter makers.

Hope for inverters?

The tariffs on inverters and other products started at 10%, and were scheduled to increase to 25% as of January 1. The White House subsequently postponed the implementation of the 25% rate, pending the outcome of negotiations between the two nations. The brevity inherent in the president’s social media vehicle of choice means only a broad brush announcement on trade tariffs were covered by last night’s update so it is not immediately clear if inverters would be helped by the apparent success in talks.

Trade talks between the countries had been extended into the weekend after a breakthrough on currency manipulation was announced last week. With state subsidies another bone of contention, the Trump administration is seeking rigorous enforcement measures related to any agreement signed by Xi at a time when the readiness of the Chinese authorities to come to the aid of debt-saddled solar developer Panda Green starkly illustrates Trump’s point. The recent program announced by Beijing to encourage solar projects to be developed without central subsidies called on state lenders and local authorities to do their utmost to incentivize such developments – arguing a special case could be made because of the overriding need to reduce carbon emissions is likely to cut no ice in a White House which has firmly nailed its colors to the fossil fuel mast.

U.K. newspaper The Guardian this morning reported news of progress in talks between the two administrations lifted Asian shares in today’s trading, with the Shanghai exchange seeing a 3.5% rise.

This also comes at a good time for the solar industry, as the global Section 201 tariff slapped on cells and modules was reduced earlier this month from 30% to 25%, as stipulated when it was introduced in February 2018.

Share

Max Hall

Max worked for pv magazine between 2012 and 2015 on a part-time basis and returned to the fold full-time in July 2018. An old-school print journalist, he has also worked in environmental consultancy, education, local government, infrastructure, aerospace, forensic science and sport.

Related content

Elsewhere on pv magazine...

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Comment

Name *

Email *

Website

Save my name, email, and website in this browser for the next time I comment.

Notify me of follow-up comments by email.

Notify me of new posts by email.

By submitting this form you agree to pv magazine using your data for the purposes of publishing your comment.

Your personal data will only be disclosed or otherwise transmitted to third parties for the purposes of spam filtering or if this is necessary for technical maintenance of the website. Any other transfer to third parties will not take place unless this is justified on the basis of applicable data protection regulations or if pv magazine is legally obliged to do so.

You may revoke this consent at any time with effect for the future, in which case your personal data will be deleted immediately. Otherwise, your data will be deleted if pv magazine has processed your request or the purpose of data storage is fulfilled.

Keep up to date

pv magazine USA offers daily updates of the latest photovoltaics news. We also offer comprehensive global coverage of the most important solar markets worldwide. Select one or more editions for targeted, up to date information delivered straight to your inbox.

Email*

Select Edition(s)*

Hold Ctrl or Cmd to select multiple editions.

We send newsletters with the approximate frequency outlined for each edition above, with occasional additional notifications about events and webinars. We measure how often our emails are opened, and which links our readers click. To provide a secure and reliable service, we send our email with MailChimp, which means we store email addresses and analytical data on their servers. You can opt out of our newsletters at any time by clicking the unsubscribe link in the footer of every mail. For more information please see our Data Protection Policy.

Keep up to date

We send newsletters with the approximate frequency outlined for each edition above, with occasional additional notifications about events and webinars. We measure how often our emails are opened, and which links our readers click. To provide a secure and reliable service, we send our email with MailChimp, which means we store email addresses and analytical data on their servers. You can opt out of our newsletters at any time by clicking the unsubscribe link in the footer of every mail. For more information please see our Data Protection Policy.

The cookie settings on this website are set to "allow cookies" to give you the best browsing experience possible. If you continue to use this website without changing your cookie settings or you click "Accept" below then you are consenting to this.